A little Lottie Picture Tour

The poor Lottie has been seriously neglected in the last month or so, life has just got in the way!  Now everything is very very overgrown,  over the last couple of days I have spent a few hours here and there trying to bring it back into some sort of order.   Today the Portuguese Housekeeper helped for a while and her help was most welcome.

A little photo update of the best bits of the lottie for you;-

The sweetcorn bed,  sunflowers to the left and lots of self seeded nasturniums from last year

The Munty frame with runner and French beans,  sweet peas and courgettes
 growing on, around and under the frame

One of the 2 pumpkin patches,  these plants are massive!

The first pumpkin starting to swell

The wild flower garden and an attempt to soften the ugly shed

Runner beans growing on the Munty frame

Pumpkin, flower and herb patch

Helpers

Today we spent the whole day pottering about in the garden.  I was hoping for a bit of a lie-in after staying up late to watch the Olympic Opening Ceremony - did you watch?  I was a little sceptical at the beginning,  however I did think it was brilliant and the lighting of the cauldron was truly magical  - anyone who knows me will tell you that sport really isn't my thing (I tell them I am allergic to sport!),  however I really enjoyed the ceremony, and felt quite excited for Team GB too and I  definately felt proud to be British!

Back to the lie-in...... we have workmen renewing the pavements in our road at the moment they started 8.00am on Monday morning and have been hard at it all week,  what we didn't realise was that they would be hard at it at 8.00 on a SATURDAY morning..  I can't say I was impressed with the beep beeping of the lorries manoeuvring at that time on a weekend and that was the end of my lie-in.  I hope they do treat Sunday as a day of rest!

Unusually I had some willing helpers in the garden today;-

From the left - Stella,  Nando, Hettie, Gillian with Flora by the rake

  

All scratching about for the best bugs and goodies

A classic chicken pose - fluffy knickers in the air!

Sadly though this weekend there are just 5 chickens as little Luna passed away on Monday.   Very peacefully in her favourite spot in her run,  I could see what was happening and as she wasn't unwell, hurt or in pain, just worn out I think,  I left her in peace in the run with Flora.  She laid quietly with Flora gently clucking around her, standing very close by and checking on her constantly until she took her last breath.   All of the chickens  were unusually quiet for the whole of the day, which was a little unsettling.  Luna was one of the ex-battery hens we re-homed 18 months ago and for an ex-batt that is a good amount of time to be living free, generally they don't live a long life after the stress of their early caged lives,  the 18 months of living free and doing normal chickeny things for her was a bonus and I have to say of the three ex-batts she was my favourite -  she was very bold, friendly, funny and vocal!  I am going to miss Luna.

For Flora the last of the ex-batts it has been a stressful week,  seeing her close friend leave her and then a couple of days roaming with the gang of 4 around the garden and finding her place in the pecking order, she has now moved in with them full time and all does seems OK with very little squabbling.   I am a little worried about her though, as she does seem subdued and as expected  she is now spending a lot of time on her own.  Time will tell now whether she will  be able to bounce back or whether it will all prove too much for this little one.  Lots of treats  and roaming in the garden is planned for a little while to keep them all occupied and hopefully help Flora find her way.

Flora sitting quietly under the table

The girls resting after a hectic day of gardening

Gillian is hogging the tyre

Little faces looking at me for MORE treats!

Thanks for your help today girls - it would have been a lot quicker without your help,  but definately not as enjoyable or entertaining!!  :)

Alison x

Queing

The barbers Mr Milly visits is busy and without an appointment system,  it is therefore 1st come 1st served.  So many times we have driven past to see the shop empty and by the time I have parked the car and got My Milly's wheelchair out the shop is full,  most often it is a dad who turns up with his 5 sons, so 6 people in front of my desparing Hubby!

This week My Boy took Mr Milly to the barbers, they left first thing in the morning to try and avoid any waiting and My Milly was determined;-

Quote from Mr Boy "No one's beating my dad into the barber's this morning"

That is one way to do it I suppose!!


Alison x 

Have you missed me??

That has been a very long blogging break... I'm trying to get back on track now.  Life in the last three weeks has been hectic some good, some not so good,  but all in all I am exhausted!

I have travelled all over the country in the last 10 days,  in fact 1500 miles of driving in those few days.  To the east to Colchester,  to the west to Wales and to the north to Manchester,  I haven't venture south but then I suppose travelling home each time would count as the south of the country!

With all of this travelling around and having visitors the poor lottie is looking a mess - the grass is long, the beds are very weedy and everything needs a good sorting out.  Fortunately I have been able to harvest with peas, potatoes and courgettes coming home in abundance.  I now have  just over a week off work and the lottie will get back on track, as will the garden, the housework and somewhere in there I am determined there will be some rest and relaxation!

No pics today as I have a new camera and haven't yet been able to work out how to upload the photos to my laptop,  to be honest I haven't had enough time to sit and work it out!   Anyway over the next couple of days I will update you with all of the tooing and frowing and I have some very very exciting news to share!!!!!!!

Alison x

A little birthday gift

This year is just flying past in an absolute flash..  I do wonder if that is a sign of getting older?

Already it seems to be birthday season in our family and in the last 2 weeks the birthdays have been;-

My brother

My Brother in Law's 50th birthday

My Nephew's 7th birthday

My Aunties birthday and 50th Wedding Anniversary

My Cousins 50th Birthday

Quite a few memorable and big events.  Some home made goodies have come in handy for little gifts along the way and my most favourite one of all was the lovely bag for my Auntie. 

Mr Milly spotted the fabric in our local haberdashery shop and after some debate about me really not needing another bag (I think I do need more bags - but Mr Milly had other ideas) I decided that it would be lovely for a gift.   

The completed bag

Isn't that lovely girlie vintagey fabric

I think my Auntie was pleased with her gift and as she was off on holiday to celebrate her Golden wedding Anniversary I am hoping she would find it useful too.    I don't think I am going to be able to resist making one of these for me though............

Alison x

Stinky

The kitchen is pongy at the moment and the reason for this?  I harvested the garlic and some of the overwintering onions.    Quite a reasonable harvest and will definately last us a while.   I was hoping to leave the garlic a little longer,  however the tops were telling me they were ready and I have since learnt that if left in the ground too long the cloves will start to split ready to loosen the bulbs for growing again.

I didn't know that about garlic and having harvested one last week and saw exactly this I decided they really did have to come up.  As with everything that comes from the Lottie they are a mixed bag of big and little ones,  but all are perfectly usable and having cleaned them up ready for storing I can confirm they are very very strong smelling!

A couple more potato plants were dug to keep up topped up for the next week or so,  some more lovely peas are now ready for podding, blanching and freezing and just to cheer me up - a lovely very sweet smelling bunch of sweet peas came home with me today too.

And lastly my lovely hubby is on his way home  - he has been to the Isle of Wight for a couple of days to spend time with his Dad and I have missed him  ......  A LOT!  I am very much looking forward to seeing him and I now really appreciate how rotten it is for Mr Milly when I am away for a couple of days EVERY week,  unfortunately in the short term that is something which is not going to change.  :(